Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça on Rome as a Community of Creativity

Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça, prefect of the Vatican's Dicastery for Culture and Education, shared his vision of Rome in a video interview for Spazio Taverna's 'Vision of Roma' project, which aims to build an archive of the future city. He emphasized that art plays a role in the literacy of feelings and emotions. The Dicastery's projects in Rome include 'Conciliazione 5', a small street gallery that builds alliances across the territory, with two annual interventions: one at Via della Conciliazione and another outside the Vatican. The 2025 program, themed around hope, is curated by Cristiana Perrella. Next year, Conciliazione 5 will focus on education and emotional literacy. The Dicastery also opens itself to contemporary art by allowing various artists to exhibit within its spaces, creating 'spaces of possibility, encounter, and collective thinking'. De Mendonça described a city not just as physical territory but as a human territory and a place of permanent creativity. He identified the Tiber River as emblematic of Rome's perpetual movement. He sees Rome as a polyphonic community that must immerse itself in contemporary cartographies, with a memory that includes not only classical antiquity but also the present. He imagines Rome as a great laboratory of creativity, an ancient city that uses imagination as a force for continuous rebirth.